-Apply all of the latest security fixes from (http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com Windows Update). XP has a nice feature to do this automatically for you, you may wish to use this. A word of caution though - faulty patches have been made it onto the update site before, they can always make it there again.

+Apply all of the latest security fixes from (http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com Windows Update). XP has a nice feature to do this automatically for you, you may wish to use this. A word of caution though - faulty patches have made it onto the update site before, they can always make it there again.

!!! Learn about firewalling

It may sound rather daunting, but in the end you will thank yourself. XP has some basic built-in firewalling...